Key Highlights Class #6 (10/21/06)

Areas of Common Interests are Challenging to Discover in Multiple Groups Cases: The Deeport Case (I was fighting for Environmental Interests)

The Deeport case started out with the Company man posturing for the dominant position and provide the first offer - the offer was Medium Industry Mix which was unacceptable from my point of view as the environmentalist; Maintain and Repair Ecological Impact which also not my first choice but I could live with, No Union Preference which was not relevant in my eyes nor were Federal Loan and No compensation. Having put this offer on the table was a chance to see where the other parties stood with regard to their own positions and right away everyone voted No to this particular proposal. When the first offer made by the company failed, I attempted to get the Union and the Governor into an Alliance along side with me thinking they could help by voting to improve the environment. After discussing, we collectively agreed on only one area where we could all to accept 2:1 Union quotas. It was challenging to find common ground with varied interests such as the Company, the Governor and the Union and in the end the conversation did not help my cause. We successfully whittled the list of demands within our little alliance but hit a road block when the Governor was unwilling to accept “Improve Ecological Impact.” At that point, I decided we would not find a common area of interest and moved onto working with the Other Ports. My rationale was that if Deeport could get a bigger loan than we could pay out a bigger sum to the Other Ports and by agreeing to voting for that, I figured the Other Ports would vote to improve the Environment. Asking questions was the key to getting the conversation moving and trying to move the conversation towards solving the problem so there would not be an impasse.
After much discussion among mini-alliances and individuals posturing for power, we collective came to a satisfactory agreement of Medium Industry Mix, Improve the Ecological Impact, Union quota if 2:1 and a $2 billion loan and Post settlement – making adjustments after the agreement. By asking lots of probing questions and creating Alliances, the two weakest parties (Other Ports and Environmental) appeared to have more leverage and power with their vote. The tone of the negotiation was tense initially but turned friendly when the Governor tried to include everyone in the decisions. It was surprising how long it took to figure out how to get the Deeport Deal done.